1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a document retrieval facilitating apparatus that mediates between a user and a plurality of databases with search engines for efficient retrieval of a document from the databases, and a document retrieval system utilizing this document retrieval facilitating apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, databases that store and control document data containing text data and image data have been widely spread. In addition, various search engines that access such a database to search document data by a pattern match using a keyword or perform logic operations have been widely used.
In recent years, with the development of a large scale computer network such as the internet, it has become easy to access a remote database. With this development, a variety of software programs are provided as search engines that can be used on the internet. Such a search engine is used to search a document database for a document, not only on the internet, but also on an intranet or the like.
However, in principle, a conventional search engine is assumed to be used to search data that are stored physically and logically in one place. For this reason, in the case where there are a plurality of accessible dada bases with search engines, a user is required to perform troublesome operations such as accessing each of the plurality of search engines individually and repeating the work of searching for a document for each search engine, in order to retrieve the document from a wide range of databases.
Furthermore, although it is possible to prepare a batch program for accessing a plurality of search engines, the way in which the search conditions such as a search keyword are assigned is different from search engine to search engine. Therefore, it is difficult to prepare a general program that covers very search engine. Moreover, the retrieval efficiency is poor.
Therefore, with the foregoing in mind, it is an object of the present invention to provide a document retrieval facilitating apparatus and a document retrieval system that can retrieve a document with a plurality of search engines efficiently, utilizing a system organized by autonomous program units referred to as agents.
A first document retrieval facilitating apparatus of the present invention facilitates document retrieval by mediating a search request containing a keyword to a database provided with a search engine. The search engine searches for a document with the keyword. The document retrieval facilitating apparatus includes a facilitating database for storing relation information indicating a relationship between the keyword and the database provided with the search engine for each keyword; and facilitating means for referring to the facilitating database using the keyword contained in the supplied search request so as to determine the database provided with the search engine to which the search request is to be sent out.
In this embodiment, the facilitating means determines the database provided with the search engine to which a search request is to be sent out by referring to the relation information indicating the relationship between the keyword and the database provided with the search engine. Therefore, the user that inputs the search request is not required to be aware of which database provided with a search engine should be searched, and a wasteful action such as searching a database provided with a search engine irrelevant to the keyword can be avoided. Thus, the present invention provides a document retrieval facilitating apparatus that can retrieve the document efficiently.
A second document retrieval facilitating apparatus of the present invention facilitates document retrieval by mediating a search request containing a keyword to a database provided with a search engine. The search engine searches for a document with the keyword. The document retrieval facilitating apparatus includes a facilitating database for storing category information indicating the type of the document possessed by the database provided with a search engine for each database provided with a search engine; and facilitating means for referring to the facilitating database using a category name contained in the supplied search request so as to determine the database provided with the search engine to which the search request is to be sent out.
In this embodiment, the facilitating means determines the database provided with a search engine to which a search request is to be sent out by referring to the category information indicating the relationship between the type of the document and the database provided with a search engine. Therefore, the user that inputs the search request is not required to be aware of which database provided with a search engine should be searched, and a wasteful action such as searching a database provided with a search engine that stores only the documents irrelevant to the category can be avoided. Thus, the present invention provides a document retrieval facilitating apparatus that can retrieve the document efficiently.
A first document retrieval system includes a database provided with a search engine that searches for a document with a keyword and a document retrieval facilitating apparatus. The document retrieval facilitating apparatus includes a facilitating database for storing facilitating information indicating the relationship between the keyword and the database provided with a search engine; and facilitating means for referring to the facilitating database so as to determine the database provided with a search engine to which the search request is to be sent out. The database provided with a search engine spontaneously notifies the facilitating database of the facilitating information.
In this embodiment, the database provided with a search engine spontaneously notifies the facilitating database of the facilitating information indicating the relationship between the keyword and the database provided with a search engine so that the content of the facilitating database is updated. Thus, in the database provided with a search engine, for example, when a new document is added or a document is deleted, the content of the facilitating database is updated. Therefore, the facilitating means can mediate in response to the actual status. Consequently, the user is not required to be aware of the current status of the database provided with a search engine, and a document retrieval facilitating apparatus that can retrieve a document efficiently can be provided.
A second document retrieval system includes a database provided with a search engine that searches for a document with a keyword and a document retrieval facilitating apparatus. The document retrieval facilitating apparatus includes a facilitating database for storing facilitating information indicating the relationship between the keyword and the database provided with a search engine; and facilitating means for referring to the facilitating database so as to determine the database provided with the search engine to which the search request is to be sent out. The facilitating means acquires the facilitating information to be stored in the facilitating database by inquiring of the database provided with a search engine.
In this embodiment, the content of the facilitating database can be updated by inquiring of the database with a search engine about the facilitating information indicating the relationship between the keyword and the database provided with a search engine. Thus, in the database provided with a search engine, for example, when a new document is added or a document is deleted, the content of the facilitating database is updated. Therefore, the facilitating means can mediate in response to the actual status. Consequently, the user is not required to be aware of the current status of the database provided with a search engine, and a document retrieval facilitating apparatus that can retrieve a document efficiently can be provided.
A third document retrieval system includes a database provided with a search engine that searches for a document with a keyword and a document retrieval facilitating apparatus. The document retrieval facilitating apparatus includes a facilitating database for storing facilitating information indicating the relationship between the keyword and the database provided with the search engine for each keyword; and facilitating means for referring to the facilitating database using the keyword contained in the supplied search request so as to determine the database provided with the search engine to which the search request is to be sent out.
In this embodiment, the facilitating means of the document retrieval facilitating apparatus determines the database provided with the search engine to which the search request is to be sent out by referring to the relation information indicating the relationship between the keyword and the database provided with a search engine. Therefore, the user that inputs the search request is not required to be aware of which database provided with a search engine should be searched, and a wasteful action such as searching a database provided with a search engine irrelevant to the keyword can be avoided. Thus, the present invention provides a document retrieval facilitating apparatus that can retrieve the document efficiently.
A fourth document retrieval system includes a database provided with a search engine that searches for a document with a keyword and a document retrieval facilitating apparatus. The document retrieval facilitating apparatus includes a facilitating database for storing category information indicating the type of the document possessed by the database provided with a search engine for each database provided with a search engine; and facilitating means for referring to the facilitating database using a category name contained in the supplied search request so as to determine the database provided with the search engine to which the search request is to be sent out.
In this embodiment, the facilitating means of the document retrieval facilitating apparatus determines the database provided with the search engine to which the search request is to be sent out by referring to the category information indicating the relationship between the type of the document and the database provided with a search engine. Therefore, the user that inputs the search request is not required to be aware of which database provided with a search engine should be searched, and a wasteful action such as searching a database provided with a search engine that stores only the documents irrelevant to the category can be avoided. Thus, the present invention provides a document retrieval facilitating apparatus that can retrieve the document efficiently.
Furthermore, the document retrieval facilitating apparatus of the present invention can be configured by a computer based platform by installing a processing program that can provide processing steps for realizing the above-described document retrieval facilitating apparatuses of the present invention.
These and other advantages of the present invention will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon reading and understanding the following detailed description with reference to the accompanying figures.